Ник Гриффин: «Кризис войны с Ираном только начинается»

The Iran War Crisis is Only Just Beginning

Источник: https://nickgriffin544956.substack.com/p/the-iran-war-crisis-is-only-just

The closure of the Straits of Hormuz has slipped from the front pages in Britain. The battle to be top cock on the Labour dung heap has pushed the Trump/Netanyahu war out of the headlines. People have already grown used to paying more at the petrol pump and for heating, and many are already treating the whole affair as background noise. This is a dangerous mistake. The strait remains largely closed to normal commercial traffic by the dual blockade, threats and insurance problems. Roughly one fifth of the world’s traded oil and a large share of liquefied natural gas normally pass through this narrow channel. The initial shock has been softened by tankers already at sea when trouble began and by releases from emergency reserves, but those buffers are running out. Real difficulties lie ahead for the world economy, for Britain, and for you and me. The Scale of the Disruption The loss of supply from the Persian Gulf is already the biggest single interruption to oil flows in history. Daily movements of around 20 million barrels of oil and significant volumes of gas have been cut to a fraction. Prices rose sharply at first, though they have settled somewhat as demand has fallen in some places and other producers have tried to make up the difference. Even so, the world has lost access to much of the spare capacity that usually cushions such shocks, most of it held in the Gulf itself.

For Britain, direct reliance on Middle Eastern crude and gas is low. North Sea output, supplies from Norway, and cargoes from the United States and elsewhere form the backbone of our energy. Yet oil is a global market. Higher international prices feed straight through to what we pay for petrol, diesel, jet fuel, and the many everyday goods whose production and transport depend on energy. Inflation is climbing, growth forecasts have been cut, and factories and transport firms are starting to feel the squeeze. Shortages Are Starting to Bite The early weeks were managed with stocks already in the pipeline and government releases. Those are now largely gone. Crude oil inventories have helped prevent major disruption so far, but refined products are causing more immediate worry. The Gulf supplies a large part of the world’s jet fuel and diesel. Europe, including Britain, is especially exposed here. Industry watchers say that without fresh arrivals, jet fuel stocks could reach critically low levels within weeks. Airlines have already seen higher costs and some disruption; a full summer season of travel could bring cancellations or sharp cuts to schedules if matters do not improve.

Once tankers can move again, it will not be a matter of days before normal supplies return. Exports would take one to two months even to arrive for processing or onward distribution even after the waterway reopens. Many oil fields need time for pressure to build and equipment to be checked. Refineries damaged in the fighting will take longer still. Full recovery of the system would stretch into many months even if peace broke out today.

Shell’s CEO just put it very bluntly:

“Even if a peace deal [with Iran] were struck today, Persian Gulf supply would not return to normal overnight. It could take up to seven months to restart most shut-in wells, as they require gas or water injections to repressurize.” Risks of Continued Stalemate or Renewed Fighting A long stalemate simply means high prices and tight supplies continue, dragging on the economy through 2027 and beyond. If the current uneasy situation continues, Britain faces years of expensive energy, slower growth, and pressure on household budgets. Falling consumption around the world will hit Chinese exports hard. Collapsing revenues for the Gulf states will become a financial crisis in the USA, as the bond purchases which prop up Washington’s debt mountain dry up. A return to open conflict would be even worse. Iran’s own oil exports could be wiped out entirely, while Iranian attacks on facilities elsewhere in the Gulf have already shown how quickly production elsewhere can be hit. Insurance costs would stay punishingly high even if some shipping resumes.

The Worst Case for Britain The most severe outcome would be the widespread destruction of oil, gas, processing plants, and related infrastructure across Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and neighbouring states. In that nightmare, the Gulf would stop exporting hydrocarbons almost completely. This would remove nearly 30 percent of normal world oil supply. Not for the period of an embargo, but for years while fields, pipelines, refineries, and ports were rebuilt. For ordinary people in Britain this would mean sustained fuel rationing or very high prices that force many drivers off the road. Heating and electricity bills would surge, hitting pensioners and low-income families hardest. Food prices would rise sharply because fertiliser, farm machinery, and transport all depend on cheap energy. Airlines would cut flights dramatically, making overseas holidays rare and expensive for most. Industries which use a lot of energy - steel, chemicals, manufacturing - would face closures or reduced hours, leading to job losses. The overall economy would shrink, unemployment would climb, and government finances would come under severe strain as tax revenues fell and spending on support rose.

Desalination plants knocked out in the Gulf, and hunger, famine and intense political unrest in many parts of the world, would create humanitarian disasters and refugee flows that would affect Europe and Britain indirectly through migration pressures and international instability. There is no recent example of a shock this large; the 1970s crises would look mild by comparison. Medium to worst case scenarios are not some remote possibility. The really unlikely end of all this is a rapid and comprehensive peace deal. Even if Trump concludes it would be best to cut and run, peace would probably see Netanyahu’s far-right religious zealot allies collapse his coalition and put him in danger of ending his career, and even life, in prison. Iran can certainly sustain the economic pain of the present situation for many months yet, and the latest leaked US intelligence reports have confirmed that Tehran’s military capability is largely intact. America and Israel can go back to flattening the country’s entire big-ticket infrastructure, but they can’t stop Iran doing immense damage to US allies and bases, and to any forces which might be used in a desperate and ill-advised effort to open the Straits by force.

Bear in mind also the fact that some of the most powerful and ruthless forces on the planet have strong vested interests not merely in continued conflict, but in drastic escalation. "The Madness of King Donald" - That's What You're Supposed to Think NICK GRIFFIN · 5 MAY Another day, another batch of headlines about erratic Trump posts and armed clashes in the Gulf. The general tone of the controlled media, the message we lesser mortals are supposed to get, is that it’s all the result of a Crazy Orange American going up against a bunch of Mad Medievalist Mullahs. Read full story What Ordinary People Can Do No one can solve the global problem alone, but households can take sensible steps to weather a difficult period of high prices and possible shortages. Reduce driving by using buses, trains, or sharing lifts, and keep vehicles well maintained for better fuel economy. Keep your tanks topped up and get a couple of filled plastic jerrycans for the boot to protect you against getting caught out by a snap fuel panic.

Stock a reasonable supply of non-perishable food and basic household goods – at least enough for a few weeks. Sooner or later, we’ll see panic buying of fuel and, if the crisis rolls on – of things such as over-the-counter medicines and food. Watch for all the toilet paper to vanish when the news breaks that not enough wood pulp is crossing the oceans! Even if the crisis is solved, there’s already inflation in the system for many months ahead, so anything you stockpile now will save you money in the end. If it will keep, if you will use it in the end, if you have storage space, and if you can afford it – buy it now. Improve home insulation and consider efficient heating options to cut energy waste. Build up some savings, if possible, to cover higher bills. Pay attention to official advice on energy use and any rationing schemes that might appear. The comfortable assumptions that the crisis has passed, or that the normality so far shows that we are immune to it, are badly wrong. The underlying shortage of oil and gas from the Gulf has not gone away, and the risks of further trouble remain high. Britain is better placed than many countries, but we are not immune. Paying attention now and preparing quietly is far wiser than waiting for the next surge in prices or empty forecourts to remind us how serious this remains.

The Political Ramifications Are Vast Two more months of deadlock, or two days of total war, and the impact will move from being the largest oil shock ever (the current situation) to causing a re-run of the Great Depression. The fact that year is the 100th anniversary of its beginning is presumably coincidental, but very fitting. The political impact of this will be huge. Not just the long-term geopolitical ramifications, which look increasingly like the moment the US hegemony was broken and, just possibly, the beginning of a better world in which, among other things, the flow of immigration into the West from countries savaged by Yankee imperialism goes into reverse as they benefit from the rise of a fairer BRICS-based system. Long before that, our current slow-motion economic car crash will speed up as everything and everyone hits the very hard wall of reality, at serious speed. If you think that the Labour regime (and its counterparts, of all political hues, all over the Western world) is unpopular and incompetent now, wait until you see what it all looks like if, one way or another, the disruption to more than a quarter of the hydrocarbons on which our society is based lasts through the summer.

Not long after the Purim War began, I wrote that our masters’ Multicultural Utopia has not yet been stress-tested. If this crisis remains unsolved, it is certainly going to be. Unfortunately, we’re not likely to get the luxury of buying popcorn and watching the show from a safe distance. This very messy upheaval will be televised (albeit with heavy System censorship), but it will also be played out live. In real streets. Some of them closer to most of us than is going to be comfortable. Nick Griffin Beyond the Pale is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.